My conservative friends think I’m too liberal; my liberal friends think I’m too conservative…clearly I’m on the right track! It seems so simple to me, we are a constitutional republic, not a democracy. Therefore, our government should be limited to the powers granted to it by the Constitution. This doesn’t mean that we are always going to be comfortable with the results but it does mean we will always be free.
Sometimes freedom will make liberals angry (re: 2nd amendment) and sometimes freedom will make conservatives angry (re: gambling et al.). Why even have a Constitution if we aren’t going to follow it? The Constitution says that gold and silver shall be used as legal tender. Why do we use Federal Reserve notes as legal tender? The Constitution says that we only go to war with a decleration of war by Congress. Why did we go to war in Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan, and Iraq again without Congress delcaring war?
I know this sometimes puts me at odds with both sides of the political spectrum, but I think that a consistant application of the Constitution is the only way to ensure the security of our individual liberties. People like to badmouth Ron Paul because he thinks we should only go to war with a decleration from Congress! How crazy! Follow the Constitution?!?!?! What a crazy bastard, right? The Constitution was intended to restrain government, not indidviduals. The Founders believed that the job of government is to “secure our rights”, why is government always infringing on our rights? Life, liberty, property. These are the things governments are supposed to protect. Yet they are taking more and more of our property and liberties away from us.
Government is evil. From the dawn of time governments have murdered individuals on a scale of which the most horrific serial killer could only dream. Remember Ruby Ridge? The Justice Department murdered a 14 year old boy and his mother, in cold blood. Remember Waco? I don’t even remember how many men, women, and children were murdered there, but once again it was the Justice Department that had blood on their hands. Can’t we all agree that murdering women and children in cold blood is not the proper role of government? Yesterday it was Ruby Ridge and Waco, tomorrow it could be a group of tea partiers.
Most of the folks I know in the Tea Party movement like to talk about freedom and liberty but they don’t seem to know what those words mean. They like like to joke about being “extremists” but then they tell me that my views are too extreme! I’m too extreme for the extremists! To quote Milton Friedman, “…the problem is I am on your side, but you’re not.”
Again, it seems so simple. Read the 10th amendment! The powers not given to the federal government are reserved to the states or the people. Remember, democracy never lasts long. I forget which Founding Father said it but “democracies are as short in their lives as they are violent in their deaths.”
I know this has been something of a rant but I hope more people start demanding that the government stick to the Constitution, secure our rights, and stop murdering our citizens. All I want is, “A government small enough to fit inside the Constitution”, as Harry Browne said. People can yell at me and complain about my views being extreme, but, my views are the Constitution. So, go ahead and hate me if you want neo-cons, but I’d rather you hate me for being who I am than love me for being someone I am not. I am just a guy that believes in freedom, is that so bad?